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Using a video clip as texture and it’s not playing/rendering but stuck as a still image
I am using the new R16 Cinema4D on a Mac Pro with OS X Yosemite which was just fully updated a few days ago. I have three plane objects with video clips used as textures. Two of the video clips are rendering as animated videos just fine and the third one is not.
The first video clip + plane object was created and I copy/pasted it to make the other two, changing only the video texture content. All other settings are exactly the same.
I’ve tried changing the format of the video clip files (from .mov to .mp4) but that did not change anything. I’ve also tried exporting the non-working video clip to an image sequence and using that, but again no change. The video clips themselves all have the same settings in terms of frame rate, resolution (1080 x 720), etc. They play fine using QuickTime from the Filer. I’ve tried using three different video clips in .mov and .mp4 format and no change.
I tried copy/pasting my entire project into a new, clean project but nothing changed.
All I get on the third nonworking video clip is a still image of the first frame of the video.
I’ve tried clicking “animate preview” in the Editor tab but that did nothing.
I am wide open to suggestions here. I need to get this third clip working.
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11 Replies
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have you tried going into the movie’s BitMap Shader/Animate tab – in the material where you link to the movie) and hit Calculate?
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Thanks Brian. Yes, I did do that. It tried it again just now and nothing changed. When I do a Make Preview render, it remains a still image.
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hmmm… try tossing the material and starting fresh
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Hi,
From my experience, it’s better to use sequences, instead of video.
The main reason is, you get better resolusion in result, and you have the control over its use in the Animation tab (have you tried going into the movie’s BitMap Shader/Animate tab – in the material where you link to the movie) and hit Calculate?)
Video is always les reliable than sequences, and you can always prepare the videos and convert them as JPG sequences in After Effects.
All you have to do later in C4D is to go to the Material editor, use for example the color option, click on texture/load image – search for the sequence and load the first of the images (mostly starts with the name of the sequence with numbers 0000) than a window will pop up asking you to save the image as texture of your project, hit “NO” or else you won’t be able to calculate the animation. Than go to the BitMap Shader/Animate tab hit calculate, and there you go.Hope I helped
Andy -
Yeah, I did that too with a totally from-scratch material. No change. I suspect there is something wrong with the video clips since I can change the video material to one of the other videos from the material/textures that do work, and then it will run them. But I can’t see what the problem is since the video clips are all the same type and from the same sources.
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Ok this is very strange now.
After four tries, I found a video clip that would animate on this third plane object as a texture. But I needed to trim a few seconds off the beginning of the clip so it would be at the right place for display. It is an .mov file 1280 x 720 just like the other clips that are working.
Just for data, working clip #1 is 11 seconds, working clip #2 is 8 seconds and working clip #3 was 9 seconds until I trimmed it down to 7 seconds by taking out its first two seconds. I did the trimming with QuickPlayer and saved it in the exact same format it started in. After trimming working clip #3, it no longer works. It will only display a static image. This is beyond frustrating. Every other variable or setting I can find is the same between these clips. What is going on?
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How much RAM do you have in your system? Not sure if that could be the issue but a thought…
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No, it’s not the RAM. There’s one more aspect to this and I realized what it was when I started playing with the length of the clips. It’s the fact that they are being shown in sequence, one after another. All three are not on the screen at the same time. First clip #1 plays, then there is a delay and then clip #2 is on screen and there is a short delay and then clip #3 displays. These are all within a few seconds of each other, but I think what’s happening is that each object exists starting at the very beginning of the animation and the video clip starts playing at the very beginning of the animation. So by the time clip #3 is visible, the video clip has already played out and that is why I’d get a still image of the last frame of the video.
I’m sure this is the problem. One just assumes that these things will start when they actually appear on screen, but that isn’t a correct assumption since the texture exists starting at 0:00. What I need to know now is how do I delay the video clip texture from starting until it actually appears on the screen? I’ve been looking but haven’t been able to find a key frame that makes sense. Any suggestions?
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in the bitmap shader/animation tab set Timing to Range and then set the Range Start to the frame you want it to start on – Range End you have to watch what you are doing because it wants to play the whole clip in the range you provide. If you set Range End to the start frame + the total number of frames it will play normally
-if you have a 30 frame clip and want it to start at frame 60, Range Start is 60 and Range End would be 90
-if you set start as 60 but end as 75 it would play the whole clip in that 15 frames (double speed)
-if you set end to 120 it would play the whole clip in 60 frames (half speed) -
Yes, this totally did the trick and resolved it entirely. It’s nice to see that I do have this level of control over the video textures. It’s funny how this hasn’t ever come up before for anyone – I couldn’t resolve this on google or in the help screens at all. Thanks for your help.
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